Perhaps
by Hecate's Wrath
Summary: And perhaps not. There are things worse than death and they have made all the difference.


_  
Hecate's Rath presents…_

_Her first Twilight fiction_

_Her_ name was Elizabeth (Carlisle usually calls her _his_ Elizabeth when Edward's not listening and when he is…well, he just lets him think he's thinking about Edward's mother) and for too long Carlisle let Edward think that the reason he 'saved' him (though saved, in this context, is used loosely and in no form of its original meaning, meaning rescued from anything. There are things worse than death.) was because he saw something in that Elizabeth's eyes that said "Please" in a different kind of way. That he felt it was wasteful, that there was no point in more death, that he couldn't leave Edward alone (though he most certainly would have died, and sometimes Carlisle wonders if that would have not been a better salvation).

But there is a different Elizabeth—_his_ Elizabeth—yet still with that same bronze hair (though hers was more blonde and only bronze when it caught the light _just so_) and those green, green eyes. _His_ Elizabeth, a girl he loved and left behind and though Esme is his soul mate, Esme is his other half, Esme is everything he could ever, ever want, there is a part of him (a very, very small part, a part that weeps and cries and whispers that no matter how many lives he saves, how much of the thirst he ignores, he is still a monster, damned to eternal flames) that wishes he would have died or changed _his_ Elizabeth or done _something_ differently so that he could still be with her, somehow. Because she reminds him of the handsome young man with the blonde hair and the sky blue eyes, a pastor's son, a prodigal (though his father loved him—of this he has no doubt).

_His _Elizabeth was three shades shy of beautiful, a hard working girl with calluses and an easy smile. She was proud and she was pretty (never beautiful) and she was _Carlisle's_ and in this world full of hurt and pain and broken pieces, there are so few things he can call his—so few things he _wants_ to call his—having something to hold on to, something to—if not live, then exist for is really all Carlisle wants sometimes, because _all_ of Esme can never be his.

Esme has a past, a story before Carlisle stepped into the pages of her nightmare and turned it to a twisted fairytale. Some other part he has nothing to do with aside from a broken leg and sixteen year old not-quite-innocence and salvation in the shape of burning pain and screaming flames. That part will never be his and, though Carlisle loves Esme, adores her, would walk through fire for her—she is not all, completely his, and that has made all the difference.

Elizabeth Masen reminds him of her, of _his_ Elizabeth. Reminds him of summer days and sweet kisses and promises he never meant to break. True, Elizabeth Masen is more beautiful, in the technical sense of the word, and Elizabeth Masen's nose is too long and too straight, her hands too dainty to be _his_ Elizabeth, but something in the starch in her spine, something in the tilt of her chin, something in the sparkle in her green, green eyes screams _his_ Elizabeth, and _that_ is why Carlisle presses his teeth to a young boy's neck, damns him to eternal flame, makes a monster and tastes his first human blood. It is selfish in more ways than one, and _this_ is why Carlisle lets Edward think that he was saved (damned) because it was "too wasteful." (Because, really, Carlisle just wanted what had been lost to him forever—really, he just wanted to save (damn) what could have been his.)

Because, perhaps, if things had been different, if Carlisle hadn't hunted, perhaps if he had been three steps behind or four seconds late, perhaps if he had simply let the old vampires be, if he had hunted them some other night—perhaps…

Perhaps he and _his_ Elizabeth would have had a son, a son like Edward, with blondebronze hair and green, green eyes. Perhaps he would have died in the century he was born in; perhaps he never would have met the almost-innocent clumsy farm girl who fell from a tree. Perhaps he would have lived to see grey and white, lived to watch _his_ Elizabeth wither away, lived to die with her. Perhaps he would have had grandchildren and would have loved his son with all that he had and would have stayed far, far away from myth and magic and vampires, and perhaps he would have lived and loved and grown old and died.

Perhaps, and then again, perhaps not—perhaps he would have fallen ill three days later and died, never to marry _his_ Elizabeth, or meet a blushing farm girl, or save the dying boy of a woman with blondebronze hair and green, green eyes.

And that has made all the difference.

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Standard disclaimer applies. Thanks for reading.


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